


Humiliation

by MissSlothy



Series: Whumptober 2019 [4]
Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Angst, Dating, First Kiss, Getting Together, Happy Ending, M/M, Medical Conditions, Mutual Pining, Pre-Slash, Scars, Whump, Whumptober 2019
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-02
Updated: 2019-11-02
Packaged: 2021-02-01 22:27:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,221
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21279881
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissSlothy/pseuds/MissSlothy
Summary: Standalone stories written as part of the #Whumptober2019 challenge hosted on Tumblr. The stories can be emotional or physical whump.The prompt for Day 25 was 'Humiliation'.When you're an ex-Navy SEAL with a ton of emotional (and physical) baggage, navigating dating is hard.
Relationships: Steve McGarrett/Danny "Danno" Williams
Series: Whumptober 2019 [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1521953
Comments: 34
Kudos: 246





	Humiliation

**Author's Note:**

> Minor spoilers: in season 10 Danny encourages Steve to start dating again.
> 
> I did actually write this in October so in my mind it still counts as Whumptober :) Thanks to the people on Tumblr who ran the challenge, it's been a lot of fun and very inspiring.

Steve parks his truck in front of the Iolani Palace. He pulls the keys out, tosses them in his hand.

It’s sunny and humid outside. Everything is bright colours; the flowers, the trees, the sky. Tourists are milling outside the Palace, taking pictures, enjoying their vacations.  
  
Inside the cab it’s cold and grey. It’s not just the fault of the air conditioning. It’s his mood, too. Sleep the night before had eluded him. Dread is weighing him down. What he really wants to do is start the truck up and drive away, to lick his wounds in private. Instead, he opens the door and gets out.  
  
Shaking his head, he tells himself to suck it up. Everyone has bad days. Splitting up with a girlfriend of a month is just a bump in the road. Life’s thrown much worse things at him.  
  
Walking into the Palace entrance he cheerfully greets the security guards as normal. There’s still a cloud hovering over him though, a dark mood he can’t shake. As he steps out of the elevator and heads for the office he feels like there’s a big arrow on his chest saying ‘_She dumped me’_.  
  
Danny and Tani are already at the computer table. He nods, straightens his shoulders, smiles at them. As smiles go, it feels convincing. Encouraged, he tries smiling some more.  
  
Danny narrows his eyes. “You okay, babe?”  
  
He loves his Danny. More than Danny knows. But some days he wants to strangle him too. “Sure.” He pretends to study the big screen. If he looks at Danny he’s going to crack - and he’s not sure he’ll be able to stop. “What we got?”  
  
Silence.  
  
Planting his hands on his hips, he turns round. Danny stares back at him. Forehead furrowed, he’s chewing on his bottom lip.  
  
Tani waves vaguely in the direction of her office. “I’m just going to....do something.”  
  
She’s already closing the door to her office before Steve can reply. Biting back a sigh he turns back to Danny. Instantly he regrets it. Danny can read him like no one else can. He glances over his shoulder, at the safety of his office. Safety is relative: Danny’s following his gaze.  
  
He’s faced down terrorists in the mountains of Afghanistan single-handed. How hard can this be? He knows what the problem is though: Danny’s looking more worried by the second. It’s making his own chest tighten painfully.  
  
“Fine,” he huffs, admitting defeat. “But not out here. In my office.”

Danny’s not going to like this. But he won’t give in until he tells him what’s wrong. Hell, he’s not going to get any work done either until he’s talked this through. And the only person who’s going to be able to understand this is Danny.  
  
He waves Danny over to the couch. He can feel Danny’s curiosity growing as he closes the blinds.  
  
“Okay,” he breathes, falling back into his own chair. “You want to know what’s wrong, huh?”  
  
Danny hums his agreement. Eyebrows raised, he waits.  
  
And waits.  
  
Steve stares back at him. Now the moment’s here, he’s got no idea where to start. He’s a bundle of emotions - anger, disappointment, humiliation - but he needs this to come out right.  
  
“How about starting at the beginning?” Danny suggests quietly, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees. “This got anything to do with last night?”  
  
“The date was going good,” he replies, rubbing his eyes with his palms as he answers Danny’s question. For his fifth date with Emily he’d booked a table at an up-market restaurant. She was great company with a wicked sense of humour. They’d been having fun.  
  
“Was?”  
  
Steve lowers his hands. Not sure where to put them, he picks at his watch strap instead. “We had dinner, a couple of drinks,” he says, staring at a frayed edge on the wristband. “I drove her home and...”  
  
‘And?”  
  
“She...she invited me in.”  
  
Silence. Then: “That’s good right? Right?”  
  
He raises his eyes to meet Danny’s. “Yeah,” he says slowly, the moment replaying in his mind’s eye. “She fixed us drinks, we talked and then...you know...”. He shrugs. He feels like a gawky teenager. It’s not a nice feeling. “We made out.”  
  
Danny leans further forward. He bobs his head. “So...you got up to some grown folks business and...”  
  
Steve feels a pang of guilt for starting this conversation. Danny’s going to hate himself for this. He closes his eyes against the errant thought.  
  
“Babe?”  
  
The worry in Danny’s voice pushes him to his feet. “Forget it. We’ve got a case we should be—“  
  
Danny’s in his space before he even gets half way to the door. “Hey. Hey. What’s the matter with you?”  
  
He looks down at Danny’s hand, planted firmly against his chest. It feels warm and solid. He fights the urge to lean into it. “The case, remember? Drugs. The boat that sunk off the North—“  
  
“No. We were talking.” Danny removes his hand so he can gesture with it. “Look, I get this is private,” he continues, understanding turning his voice soft, “but you started this conversation.” He pauses, tilts his head so they’re looking straight into each other’s eyes. “I haven’t seen you this wound up for a long time. You know I’m just gonna keep asking, don’t you?”  
  
The love he feels for Danny makes him swallow his sharp retort. “Yeah. I know.” Glancing away, he considers his options. There’s only one. “Let me show you,” he sighs, the dread growing as he unbuttons his shirt.  
  
Danny’s gaze is laser-focused as his fingers unfasten every button. As the shirt falls away, Danny takes a step back. Rubbing his hand over his hair, he frowns. “I don’t see what that’s got to—“  
  
Steve grabs the bottom corners of the shirt. He suddenly feels very exposed. The humiliation he'd felt the night before comes rushing back. “We were making out. She...um...she undid my shirt and she saw...this.”  
  
Danny eyes run down his naked chest. Steve reminds himself that the heat he sees in Danny’s eyes is just a figment of his imagination. “What? I still don’t get—“  
  
“This,” he says quietly, pointing to a huge bruise along his flank that he’d picked up the day before, courtesy of a perp hitting him with a crow bar. “And this,” he adds, his voice dropping as he runs his finger down the scar that bisects his torso.  
  
“So?” Danny’s tone is still even. But there’s a hint of anger creeping in. “It’s just...it’s just a bruise and a scar.”

“Yeah.” Pinching his nose, he looks away. The memories from the night before are coming thick and fast. “When she saw it…” He falters. The look on Danny’s face is killing him. “It kinda…it kinda killed the mood.”

“_Babe_—"  
  
He looks away from Danny. Not all the blame lies with Emily. This anger he’s feeling, it’s not directed at her. “I didn’t tell her about the transplant.”  
  
Danny huffs. Hands on his hips he starts pacing. “You would have told her when you thought the time was right.”  
  
“Would I?” He’s had a lot of time to think during the night. “When? Over dinner? At the movies? When we took Eddie to the park? It was never going to come up.” 

Danny turns away, muttering under his breath. When he turns back, he’s no longer trying to hide his anger. “She still shouldn’t have reacted like that—“  
  
All the anger and humiliation he’s been trying to ignore comes to the surface. Words fall out of his mouth. “What do you want me to do Danny? Force her to sleep with me?”  
  
Danny’s horrified expression speaks volumes. “No! Of course not—”

“So what, she’s supposed to ignore it?”

Danny’s hand slices through the air between them. It stops them both in their tracks. They stare at each other, breathing hard. 

“You need to call her,” Danny suggests after a pause, his soft tone at odds with the charged atmosphere in the office. “Explain it to her.”

“Danny—"

Danny reaches out, rests his hand on his forearm. “I know it’s hard. But you’re gonna have to tell her. You said you liked her. I’m sure if—"  
  
He rests his hand over Danny’s. “I did tell her. Last night.”

Danny’s face falls. “Do I want to know?”

He shakes his head. He’d tried to explain it to Emily as he’d got dressed again. Somehow the words just hadn’t come out right. Explaining how Danny had saved his life by crashing a plane on a beach wasn’t, with hindsight, the best way to reassure her. “She…asked for a rain check.”

Danny pulls away, starts pacing again. “Okay, okay. A rain check isn’t a big deal—”

“Stop.”

“You call her, you have dinner—”

“I’m not calling her, okay.” Rubbing at the back of his neck, he sighs. “She texted me this morning. She…she doesn’t want to see me again.”

Danny’s devastated expression is like a blow to his heart. “But you _like_ her.”

Crossing his arms, he forces himself to meet Danny’s eyes. He hopes he doesn’t look as disappointed as he feels. “I do. I _did_. But not everyone can deal with being in a relationship with someone like me—”

Danny’s throws his hands in the air, his body animated with anger. “Someone like _you? _A highly decorated Navy SEAL who was injured in the line of duty—”

“It’s okay—”

“It’s _not. _I’m gonna call her—”

“No!” He grabs Danny by the shoulders, brings him to halt. “She’s a finance adviser.” He lets go of one shoulder to tap his own chest. “She’s probably never seen anything like this.” He swallows hard, hating himself for straying into this territory with Danny. “It’s a lot to take on. You know that.”

Danny shrugs out of his grip. Crossing his arms, he stares at his feet. “It’s just a scar,” he mumbles.  
  
Steve smiles, weakly. Danny sounds so pissed off on his behalf. The hollow feeling in his chest is gradually being replaced by warmth and love. But they both know the truth – it’s not just a scar. He has a strict daily drug regime he follows to reduce the risk of organ rejection. And that’s even before he thinks about the fallout from the radiation poisoning or any other chemical weapons he’s probably been exposed to over the years.

The important thing, he reminds himself, is that Danny doesn’t see that when he looks at him. It lifts him out of his dark mood, helps salve the feeling of humiliation that’s still stalking him.

“Come here, Steven.” 

He blinks back to the present. Danny’s holding out his arms.

“C’mon,” Danny repeats, gesturing with his hands. “You need a hug.”

He steps forward without hesitation. Wrapping his arms around Danny, he closes his eyes. When Danny shuffles in closer, tucking his chin over his shoulder, he tightens his grip. He breathes in Danny’s scent, takes comfort from his touch.

The moment doesn’t last long enough. 

A timid knock on the door has them pulling apart from each other. Looking down, he realises his shirt is still unbuttoned. He’s fumbling with the first button when Tani appears around the door.

“I need you out here,” she says, not missing a beat as her gaze travels over both of them. “I’ve got Lou on the phone…”

H50H50H50

The rest of the day is spent solving the case. When Steve finally pulls up outside his house that evening the sun’s just setting. He feels exhausted, both mentally and physically, and it’s not just from solving the case.

Walking in the house he finds Junior’s just leaving, with a reluctant Eddie in tow. Junior’s hurried explanation that Tani’s just called him to ‘fix something at her house’ doesn’t fool him. He nods anyways, tells Junior he’ll see him tomorrow.

Going into the kitchen he finds a six-pack of beers. A hunt through the cupboard reveals a packet of chips. Making a mental note to buy more before Charlie comes over again, he takes everything out to the chairs by the beach.

He’s on his first beer when he hears the Camaro. He puts the bottle to his lips, takes a long gulp.

The sun’s set but the lights are still on in the house. He watches as Danny appears on the lanai. Leaning down, he opens another beer. As Danny walks in front of him he hands it over. They drink in silence for a while.

“Don’t let her put you off,” Danny says eventually, slipping back into their earlier conversation as if they haven’t spent the day being shot at by bad guys. “Get back on the horse.”

He watches the waves breaking as he takes another long drag from his beer. “Maybe.”

“Lynn understood—“  
  
He lowers his chin, hoping the shadows are hiding his face. Puffing out his cheeks, he huffs. “We didn’t really talk about it either—“  
  
“What?”  
  
He shrugs helplessly. “She was a psych major. She looked after troubled adolescents.” He gestures with hands, trying to illustrate with his hands what he can’t find the words for. “She just...kinda...navigated us round it.”  
  
Danny tilts his head, considering that. “I get it,” he concedes, sounding tired. “I just...I don’t understand…why wouldn’t someone want…” He trails off, waving his beer bottle in his direction.

Steve leans over to clink bottles with him. “Thanks, buddy,” he says, thinking the same about Danny. 

They drink more beer.

Danny’s gone quiet beside him, staring sightlessly into the darkness. He leaves him with his thoughts for a short while. But he can’t ignore the way Danny’s nursing his beer bottle, or the way he’s looking more morose by the second.

“We should be celebrating,” he announces, nudging Danny with his elbow. “We did good today.”  
  
“Yeah.” Danny raises his beer, aborts the move. “I’m sorry,” he says, after a pause. “Maybe…this dating thing, I pushed you into it.”  
  
Steve hesitates. Danny sounds so uncertain. That’s not right. “You apologising to me?” he asks, adding the hint of disbelief he knows Danny will expect.  
  
Danny shifts in his chair to face him. “Don’t get used to it,” he grumbles, the corners of his lips starting to twitch.  
  
Reassured, he settles back in his chair. “I’ve been enjoying it,” he admits, grudgingly.  
  
Danny’s eyebrows wiggle in disbelief. “Really?”  
  
“Okay, perhaps not all of it,” he corrects. He and Eddie won’t be going back to that dog park for a while. “But you were right. I need to get out there.”

Danny sticks out his bottom lip. “Mmmm.”

“Mmmm?” He frowns as he studies Danny’s face. “Come on, you were the one who started this. You took a risk, got back together with Rachel. You’re happy. You’re setting a good example.”

Danny starts picking at the label on the bottle. “Yeah. About that…” Taking a gulp of beer, he meets Steve’s gaze. “Rachel and me. We decided to call it a day.”

His beer bottle slips out of his fingers. He grabs it just in time. “What? You guys were good. You went to Maui and—”

“That’s the point,” Danny cuts in. “We did a lot of fun things. It was like starting over, before Grace and Charlie came along. We never talked about the bad things, all that stuff that split us up.”

“Like you being a cop.”

It’s a statement, not a question, but Danny answers anyway. “That. And Charlie.” He looks at Steve sideways. “And there’s…other stuff.”

“I’m sorry. I really am.”

“Me too.”

He raises his beer bottle: he doesn’t want Danny to see his face. His heart’s fluttering with excitement. But it aches for Danny too. “You should have told me.”

Danny leans over, until their shoulders touch. He’s staring out to the sea. “I figured one of us should be happy, huh?”

The loneliness in Danny’s voice brings him to his feet. “Hug,” he blurts out.

Danny hesitates for a moment. Then they’re in each other’s arms.

It lasts much longer this time. They cling on to each other, swaying on the spot. There’s no sound apart from the waves breaking on the beach.

Eventually they pull apart. If they both rub at their eyes neither of them mention it. They take their seats. The air is buzzing with nervous anticipation. They both retrieve their beers but neither of them drink.

Steve clears his throat nervously. Danny’s crash-course in dating has given him more confidence. He’s learning to take risks. But despite that moment they just shared there’s still a chance he’s totally misread this. 

He takes a deep breath. “You know what really sucks about breaking up with Emily?”

Danny meets his gaze. 

“I’ve still got a table booked at that new sushi restaurant in Waikiki. I wondered if you wanted…if you’re free…” He hesitates. He’s probably about to humiliate himself – again. But Danny’s gaze is unwavering. And his eyes – his eyes are full of love. “_Oh_.”

“Doofus,” Danny breathes, leaning forward until their lips are just inches apart. “Are you asking me out on a date?”

His brain is whirring. He can hear his heart beating. “Yes?”

“You’re gonna pay, right?”

Danny sounds nervous. _Abort mission _his instincts are yelling at him. “Forget it. It was a stupid idea—”

“Get over here, you idiot.” 

“I’m not an id—” Suddenly he loses the power of speech. Danny fingers are sliding across the back of his neck. He shivers, desire pooling in his belly. He gasps in surprise as Danny’s lips brush his. When Danny deepens the kiss he returns it. He groans as his long-denied feelings rush up to consume him.

He’s liked all the women he’s ever dated. One of them he used to love. But he’s never felt emotions like this before. All his nerve-endings are alight. 

They’re both on their feet, hands exploring. A beer bottle gets tipped over, hitting the sand with a soft thud. They stumble, collapse to their knees.

_“Ow.”_

He pulls away, concern dulling his overheating desire. Danny’s sprawled across the sand, wincing as he rubs his knee. Danny’s dress shirt is unbuttoned to his navel. His hair is ruffled, his cheeks flushed. He reaches out to touch, drawn like a moth to the gorgeous red-hot flame that’s burning in front of him.

Danny slaps his hand away. “Animal,” he grumbles, climbing awkwardly to his feet.

Something inside him recoils. It acts like ice cold water over his head. “Sorry. Too fast—"

Danny grabs the front of his tee-shirt. He reels him in for a hard, demanding kiss. Pulling back, he licks his lips. “Bed. Now.”

His desire ignites again. All doubts are gone. By the time Danny’s dragged him across the garden and up the stairs it’s raging like a furnace. 

He closes the bedroom door behind them. He sucks in a breath, shivers as Danny’s hands slide under his tee-shirt and over his belly. As they go lower, fingers tucking into the waistband of his cargo pants, he widens his stance. Leaning down he sucks on the curve of Danny’s neck. When Danny groans, curses under his breath, arches his body, he thinks: _Perfect, you’re fucking perfect, Danny._

It’s the last coherent thought he has for a long time.

The End

**Author's Note:**

> The reason I didn't post back on the 25th was because I was worried about how I was portraying the woman in this story. She's only mentioned in a couple of sentences but I didn't want her to be the 'bad guy' in this story, that's not my intention at all. Hopefully that's not how she comes across. And at the end of the day, she pushes Steve and Danny to admit their feelings for each other. That's good, right? ;)


End file.
